Steven E. Crider Homepage

01.17.03	02.21.03	03.27.03
01.31.03	03.04.03	04.09.03
02.04.03	03.10.03	05.29.03
02.11.03	03.21.03
02.14.03	03.24.03

(05.29.03)

Getting Lazy. You'd think being laid off, I'd be able to sit around all day and make updates to my website. Hasn't happened, though.
Yes, I'm still unemployed. Two months now. Job search is going slow and there are no real prospects on the horizon. Not only that, but there have been only a few jobs that I've even wanted to apply for. Sure, there's all kinds of IT stuff out there, just not much that seems appropriate for me. Ugh!

Let's see... what's been happening over the nearly two months since I've made an update... hmm... Well, Kim and I are back to playing volleyball. It's sort of a mixed bag. The Rec Plexx couldn't get enough teams to fill-up rec and competitive groups, so they combined what they had into a single group. The teams are roughly split in half - four from the combative... err... competitive group and four from the rec group (which we're normally a member of). As such, we're basically getting our butts kicked by the competitive teams. It's pretty pathetic, too. Hopefully they'll have enough teams to prevent this from happening in the next session. We'll see.

I'm back to sailing on a regular basis, which is cool. I help crew a friend's boat, a J-33 called Planet Red, which we race every Saturday. We've only had two races thus far. The first race was a nightmare. The weather was terrible and, by the time we were heading back in, fog had reduced visibility to around 50-75 yards. Couldn't see a thing. Not land, other boats... nada. Pretty freaky. We ripped a sail and, since we literally couldn't find the committee boat (finish line) because of the fog, Tom (boat owner/skipper) decided to just call it quits. As such we ended up with a DNF.
The second race was a blast. The weather was better and, even though we had just three people on the boat, we had a great time. Tom let me drive on both downwind legs, while he and Jim worked the spinnaker. It was great! First time I've ever gotten to drive during a race. Sweet!
We have another race this Saturday. Go Planet Red!

Kim and I went downstate to visit my parents at the beginning of May. Had a great time. Kim got to meet more of my family, which was nice.
While we were there, I hooked up a new Dell PC my parents bought. They've been talking about getting a computer for some time, and they finally made it happen. They wanted my help getting it all done. At first I thought about getting them a Macintosh. Macs are just easier to use and there's generally less crap to deal with than with PCs and the Windows OS, but in the end I went with a Dell. I did that mostly because Sue uses a PC at work and she wanted a computer to - among other things - help her get more comfortable and increase her computing skills. I figured having a Mac at home wouldn't really help that and, in fact, would cause more confusion than was necessary.
So, I helped them buy a Dell and we hooked it up while Kim and I were there. I also talked them into get a cable modem for Internet access as it's not only faster than existing dial-up access, but it's just easier to use overall (and not that much more expensive). Dial-up can really suck because the connections can be flaky, it is sometimes difficult to get connected and can be a pain to troubleshoot.
With a cable modem, it's always on, so they don't have to worry about the connection process when they want to surf the web or check email. Having a cable modem basically removes one of the more trouble-prone steps from the whole process, which is nice.
Last, but not least, with them having a cable modem, I can connect to their computer remotely to help support them. Yeah, that can be done via dial-up as well, but dial-up connections are so slow that it makes the remote connection difficult to use. With the cable modem, all they have to do is turn on their computer, give me the IP number and we're off and running.
I've updated their OS and virus defs, installed software, walked them through processes and fixed a few problems. It's really made things a great deal easier on all of us.

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(04.09.03)

BLECH! I hate being laid off. Seriously... it sucks ass. I'm what, two weeks into this deal and I'm already climbing the walls. You'd think I'd be sitting here playing computer games all day, but the motivation just isn't there. For me, gaming was tied to working: the harder I worked, the more I wanted to play. With me not working, I just don't have much desire to play. I guess maybe that's a good thing.
The stupid-assed weather around here isn't making things much better. We get a few days of 60-70 degree weather, then it drops below 30 and we get four inches of snow. It's starting to warm back up now, so I'm looking forward to that. Hopefully it'll get me motivated to get out of the apartment and maybe do something like ride my bike or take a walk down to the local bar ;-P.
I'm trying to save money by not actually doing anything that costs money, so that limits what I can get out and do. I mention this because if I don't start getting out of this apartment on a semi-regular basis, I'm going to go ape-shit. Seriously. I keep making jokes to Kim about futzing with her cat during the day, but the truth is, if I don't start getting out and about, Kim's gonna come home and find her cat dressed as Ollie North sharing tea and biscuits with me around the coffee table.
I start making my calls to unemployement next week. I still haven't finished my freakin' resume, damnit. The good news is I was able to get a copy of my original, circa-1995 resume from my old company. I couldn't find a copy of that thing so I didn't have the info handy of my career prior to the company that laid me off. Thank god they had one on file.

I've been watching waaaaaaaay too much war correspondence recently. I took a break yesterday and didn't watch any, except for a few bits in the morning and late at night.
I watched the big, iron statue of Saddam come down in central Baghdad this morning. I was hoping the Iraqis would be able to bring it down themselves, but no way. Cool to see the American M-88 tank recovery vehicle help topple that sucker.

How about them Cubbies? I know it's early, but they're playing pretty good ball. Better ball than I've seen them play in a looooooooooooong time. Fans appear to be getting into Hee Seop Choi, the new first baseman from Korea. In fact, during yesterday's win over Montreal, a "Hee Seop" chant could be heard at several times during the game.
Not only is the pitching looking sharp thus far, but the offense is actually - GASP! - producing runs! That was a big complaint last year, that the offense just wasn't producing. Well, they're doing it now.
Yes, yes, yes... I know it's still very early in the season, but it's not often Cubs fans have something to be excited about this early on. So there. ;-P
Note: Sweet-ass!! Mark Prior just hit an RBI single to make it 3-0 Cubs in the bottom of the 8th. Nice when a pitcher can help his own cause like that.

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(03.27.03)

Hello? Unemployment office? Yes, I need to file... Yup... you can now include me among the great unemployed masses. My company laid me off. I learned about it Wednesday of last week (19th) and my last day in the office was Tuesday (3/25). I had to spend some time transitioning things to Andrew, the poor soul saddled with taking things over.
Andrew's been my assistant for the past few years, and now it's up to him and John to take care of the region. They have the skills, but it's going to be hard for them. I wish them the best of luck. Honestly.
My layoff wasn't performance based by any means. It was purely economical. Without going off on a hugely negative rant about the whole deal, suffice it to say the company is in real financial trouble and they wanted to cut as much salary as possible in order to survive. Thus my layoff. Lucky me.
So, I'm starting the whole process of getting the unemployment compensation going, updating the resume, etc. The whole resume thing is slow going and frustrating beyond belief. I'm really kicking myself or not making notes and/or updating my resume as I went along over the past eight years I was with the company. Guess I learned my lesson about that.
I'm alternating being mild panic and not giving a shit about my being without a job. If I think about it too much, I edge quickly toward the panic side of things. I mean, my company is in such dire straits that I didn't even get any severance pay. Eight years and no severance. I know things are tough all over and there are plenty of people out there worse off than me, but I'm still pissed about that. Fuckers.
Well, enough for now. I'm tired of thinking about it all and need to work on my anger management by blowing the shit out of some aliens on my computer. Maybe I'll fire up a flight sim and drop some bombs on Baghdad.
Peace!

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(03.24.03)

Happy Birthday, LOML!!! Kim's birthday was this past Sunday, the 23rd. I'm not allowed to say how old she turned, for fear of death. Seriously. Not only would she kick my ass, but then she'd break me into tiny little pieces and feed me to her freakin' cat. Damn cat.
Happy birthday, LOML!! I love you!!!

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(03.21.03)

Weeee Arrrrre the Chaaampioooons, My Friiieeend Timmy! went 2 for 3 last night to wrap up first place for the co-ed recreational volleyball league over at the Rec Plex (the actual win-loss is incorrect on that page... should be 28-2 for Timmy!).
I guess the good news is, the first place team doesn't have to pay their team fee for the next session. Yippee!! Guess it's better than nothing. I'd sure like a snazzy t-shirt like the Chicago Sport & Social Club gives away. Playing volleyball in that league for many years is how I built up my t-shirt collection!
The funny thing is, we really played like shit this last match. I dunno if it's because we knew we could lose all three games and still take first place, or what. But we played B-A-D. I hate ending the session like that.
Oh well... at least we took first place. Here's to hoping The Wise Guys drop back down to the rec group. I'd much rather take second place after some hard-fought battles, then first place after a session of winning against rejects from the Special Olympics.
Unfortunately, we're just not good enough to move up to the competitive group. That's another thing I miss about the Chicago Sport & Social Club... they had recreational, INTERMEDIATE and then competitive. Intermediate was where we always used to play back in the 'old days', and that's what we need now at the Rec Plex. Who knows... maybe I'll lobby for that.

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(03.10.03)

Fun All Around Timmy! won all three games last week. I thought it was supposed to be best of three, but it's not. We play three games regardless. The team we played was kinda fun. They joked about our being good by saying we should be required to play with our shoes tied. The nice thing about that is they were trying to make light of the vast difference in skill, rather than be jerks and complain about it. We've had that all season, where teams get pissed and start pouting about getting beat. It's not like we're trying to embarrass them, or anything. It just works out that way.
Last week's game was with the 4th place team, we play the 3rd place team this Thursday, then the 2nd place team the following and final Thursday. It's the 2nd place team we lost a game to recently, killing our chance at a perfect season. Oh, well... can't win 'em all. Literally, it appears.
The 2nd place team lost all three games last week and is now down in 3rd, and the 3rd place team is now up in 2nd. The good news is, given our current records, we can lose all remaining six games and the worst we'll do is tie for first. The 2nd place team just needs to lose one game and we get the trophy. They'll certainly lose one game when we play them this Thursday.

Looks like I'm gonna get to sail with Tom this summer. We're set to do six races from early May to late-June. It's been several years since I've done any yacht racing and I'm looking forward to getting back into it. I hope my ankle will allow me to get up and down the boat during turns okay. That's probably my biggest concern at this point, whether or not my ankle can take the stress. Believe it or not, there's a great deal of scrambling during a yacht race. Add to that all the hazards on deck as you're scrambling about and it's easy to stumble, crack your head on the boom or take a humiliating fall (not that I've ever done any of those before). Guess we'll find out how well I can move in a couple of months.
It'll be good to hang out with Tom again. He's a good guy. He's good people! Maybe I'll finally be able to meet his twin daughters (Sarah Jean & Emelia Josephine) and see Juliann again.
Here's a not-so-detailed photo of Tom's boat, a J/33 called Planet Red... slinky

The TJS outing this weekend was a blast. I won't waste much space here on the event as I have a write-up here.

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(03.04.03)

Winter Sucks! I am *so* tired of winter. The weather has been so up-n-down lately that my sinuses feel like they're going to explode. UGH! I wish it'd just start getting warmer already. I'm not talking full-on summer, or anything, just maybe some stable temps in the 40's, for Christ's sake.

Timmy! finally lost a game during our last match. We went 2-1 and, frankly, I had more fun that match than I've had this entire season. We finally had some competition for once, and I hit the best spike I've ever hit in my entire life. It all just came together: perfect set (thanks, Amy K!)... perfect timing... *boom* KILL! Woo hoo!!!
Playoffs start this week. Three rounds, I think, best of three games each match/round. It's kinda silly the way they do the playoffs, because it's not so much a matter of winning and moving on as it is continuing to rack up wins in general and coming out with the best win/loss ratio at the end. Whatever. We're in first by five games, so we'd really have to lose it bad to not take first place. The RecPlex, where we play, has a standings page online here.
Hee hee... the team that took first place last season (Wise Guys) moved up to the competitive group and is in last place. They pretty much creamed us when we were both in the rec league (we took second place behind them), but we're a much better team than we were last season so it'd be interesting if they dropped back down to our league. The funny thing about that team is, they're not all that good, they're just very consistent. They don't make many mistakes, but by the same token, they don't have that explosive offense you find in the competitive league. I'd giggle my ass off if they limped back down to the rec league.

Oh, man, I almost forgot! We're finally having another meeting of The Johnson Society (TJS for short) this weekend. The place we picked is a relatively new place in the city called Fago de Chao. This place looks amazing. Just going over their menu online starts me doing the Homer slobber.
Yes, I truly enjoy being a carnivore.

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(02.21.03)

Sweet Blessed Friday! Nothing much to report. I'm pooped. We went 3-0 again at volleyball last night, so we're still undefeated. Joy. Yes, that's sarcasm. I really hope there's more competition in the next session. Oh, I racked up another pitcher of beer last night by hitting one of my first-serves into the net. Kim got one, too. It was hysterical. For some reason we all just started going "hit the net... hit the net", and she hit the net. She was all pissed off. Too funny.

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(02.14.03)

Happy Valentine's Day! Let's see... Kim got flowers at work last week for our one-year dating anniversary, and she got flowers yesterday at work for Valentine's Day. I really need to buy stock in 1800flowers.com!

So, Timmy! is still undefeated. The scary thing is, we had about as much competition last night as we're gonna get this session, and we still won 3-0. Ugh. I guess the good news is, I actually got to work up a decent sweat. Oh, and it's my turn to hold onto and fondle our 2nd Place trophy from the last session. It's sitting on the credenza behind me here in my office. Yay!

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(02.11.03)

One Year, Baby! Kim and I celebrated our one year dating anniversary last Friday. One year... I can't believe it, for many reasons, chief among them my not believing she's been able to put up with my crap for this long. I know, I know... contrary to popular belief I am NOT perfect and, in fact, have a great many faults. I'm sure Kim would be happy to compile a listing of my faults, but suffice it to say I can be quite the Earl of Ass Pain sometimes.
So, hats off to ya, LOML... you are literally the first woman who has cared enough about me to put up with my shit for this long. You're aces, baby!

Volleyball team is still undefeated. This is getting pretty silly, to be honest. I mean, there's just no competition in this rec league. Last session, there was one team clearly better than us, we ended up in second place behind them, and there was at least one other team that gaves us a good run for our money.
But the first place team from last session moved up to the competitive league - where they're getting trounced, much to my glee - and the other team is nowhere to be found. At least we haven't played them yet, so maybe they're still in the rec league and we'll happen upon them soon. I hope so because it's difficult to get up for a game when the play is so one-sided.

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(02.04.03)

New Ramble Archive. Yay! I finally got around to archiving off the rambles for the second half of 2002. There's a link at the top of the page for the archive. It appears I actually managed to not screw up all the links while modding the tables, too, which is a plus.

Another thing I finally got around to doing was making an eye doctor appointment. I've been going without my glasses for about, oh, a good eight months or more when they, uh, broke. *cough* I've been doing okay, for the most part, but I've been getting headaches alot lately. So, it's time to get the ol' eyes checked out and see about some new specs.
Everyone keeps recommending I go with contacts, but I tried them back in high school and hated 'em. I know the technology for contacts has advanced quite a bit since I've been in high school, but still, I just don't want them. I love being able to rub the shit out of my eyes without worrying about popping out a contact or losing one behind my eyeball. ::shudder:: I hated that feeling of losing a contact way up high or low. Yuck!

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(01.31.03)

New Webhosting. I finally dumped that shitty Bluedomino webhosting and switched over to Webmasters.com. There are several reasons why I made the change, but the biggest reason why I even began looking was because of the horrible email performance.
You see, each of BD's servers hosts multiple customers, as do most 'standard' webhosting services. Well, one of the idiots that happens to be on my server got the server blacklisted for sending tons of SPAM. As such, even though I had nothing to do with the spamming (seriously!), mail being sent from my domain - that was hosted on that blacklisted server - was getting bounced back as undeliverable. Fully 75% of all email I've been trying to send has been bouncing back for well over a month. They kept saying they'd get it fixed, but never did and I got tired of waiting.
BD offered -- no, wait, they didn't offer now that I think about it. I got pissed and told them I wanted to be switched to another server, and they said it'd take a couple days before they could get to it and then I'd have to change my DNS pointers, cross my fingers, etc. I told them to forget about it and that's when I started looking for another webhost.
I ended up landing on Webmasters.com for a couple of reasons: 1) it's half the cost of Bluedomino and less than just about anything I could find, and 2) the features offered pretty much beats everything I could find.
So, I setup my account with them yesterday, got all my files uploaded, submitted my DNS changes and everything took effect this morning. Other than having to request SSIs being enabled, it all went off without a single hitch. Very slick and and I'm extremely happy with my experience thus far. Of course, it's been like two days, so we'll see. I was very happy with Bluedomino in the beginning, too.
What's funny is that Neddy was looking for webhosting several weeks ago and I mentioned that I was looking at Webmasters.com. So, he headed on over and like a week later had his account setup. He's quick that way.

Well, my volleyball team (Timmy!) is still undefeated after the third week of the session. Truth be told, the other teams in the rec league are pretty pathetic. The only way we're going to lose a game, let alone a full match, is if we completely fall apart.
We played the team we were tied for first with going into last nights match and pretty much trounced 'em. We're having fun, but a little more competition would be nice. I'm not saying we're all that great, it's just that the other teams really do suck. Bad.
The good news is my shoulder feels better. The doc calls it a 'rotator sprain' and said I won't do any more damage by playing volleyball (unless I dive and land on it again), it's just a matter of how much pain I can stand. The first two matches it was hurting pretty badly during the game, so much so that I was having to lay off spiking and serving over-hand. But, after a full week of taking anti-inflammatories, I decided to go for it and to my utter relief was able to play at about 90% (as opposed to 50% before). I was hitting the ball well (for me) and got a few good kills in.
The bad news is, and really, it's not all that bad, I owe two pitchers of beer to the team now. We have this 'first serve' rule that states if you don't get your first serve in each time it's your turn to serve, you owe a pitcher of beer.
You see, last session we were all missing our first serves like crazy, so Derick came up with this idea and it's been working well. I owed no beer up until last nights match. Come the third and final game, I was pooped, my arm was sore and I hit two first-serves right into the net. Oh, well. It's not so bad. At least I don't owe the most at this point.
Oh, I almost forgot... Kim served a 15-0 game last week! My girlfriend rocks! :-)

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(01.17.03)

Holy Crap! Has it really been two months since I've entered a ramble? Sheez. Not sure what happened. I got busy with work and the holidays, then I started playing around with some new web logging software that I thought I might use to redesign my website, and the next thing I know it's two months later and I haven't done dick! Lordy, lordy... where DOES the time go?

Let's see... what's been happening.... Christmas was nice. I headed down the weekend before to spend it with my family. It was nice to see everyone. Usually I take the entire week of Xmas off and spend it down-state, but with Andrew (my assistant at work) going to Europe with his family the last two weeks of the year, I had to reschedule and head down the weekend before.
Since I had to work the week of Xmas and was going to be home, that meant I was able to spend Xmas with Kim and her family. It was a nice time. Kinda strange spending Xmas with someone other than my own family, but still it was nice. Hotter than hell, as Kim's brother Mark likes to stoke the fireplace every seven minutes, but still nice.
Kim and I spent New Year's Eve with our friends Tony and Heather. We had a great time. Had dinner at Retro Bistro and then back to our place for Stilton and port, and champagne at midnight. All in all, a great time.
Unfortunately, I didn't start 2003 off too well. For the first time in like ten years, I wasn't all hung over New Year's Day, which was nice, but that night I got sicker than a dog. Got hit by the stomach flu. Don't worry... I won't go into any details. Suffice it to say I was home from work that Thursday and Friday, which was really terrible timing because my friend Mark Chandler was passing through town (he's currently living/working in Australia with his wife, Amber) and was scheduled to stay with us that Thur/Fri. Well, I was pretty much worthless. I did the best I could, but unfortunately I spent the better part of both days on the couch.
So, Mark leaves Saturday morning and I start feeling better Sunday. Monday I'm pretty close to 100% and go to work just fine. Monday night, around midnight, I suddenly wake up in bed itching like crazy. I thought maybe the damn cat got fleas or there was something in the bed biting/stinging me. I was breaking out all over with some kind of rash. Around 4:00am, when it was clear whatever this was wasn't going away and was - in fact - getting worse, I finally went down to the hospital, which is thankfully five minutes away, and they told me I'd broken out in hives. HIVES!! What the hell is that? I've never broken out in hives in my life, and other than Kim's stupid cat, I'm not allergic to anything. Well, the doc says it sometimes happens, that people who have never broken out in hives will just suddenly do so and never have it happen again. Oh, joy... lucky freakin' me.
Well, I got home around 5:30am with prescription in hand and had to take Tuesday off work to recover from the damned hives. Talk about miserable. For a week after, every afternoon around 3:00pm I would start breaking out again. Like clockwork. I was taking medication, but for some reason, every afternoon, here they'd come. I'd have to bolt early from work just so I could get home, rip my clothes off and lie there on the couch with an ice pack trying to hold back the hives. Ugh. I wouldn't wish that experience on anyone.

What else... the winter session of volleyball started up last night. We went 3-0 for the first match. Nice, but the team we played sucked ass, so it's not a major victory or anything. It'll take a bit to get back into the swing of things. We got our 2nd place trophy from the last session. Yay!
My shoulder is still hurting from the last game of last session, where I was diving around like a madman and at one point landed very hard on my right shoulder. If it were my left shoulder, it'd be okay, but since I'm right handed, it's causing problems. Even though it's been getting better in the weeks since it happened, last night after a few spikes it started really hurting again. So much so that after the first game I didn't spike anything. I couldn't as it just hurt too much. This really sucks. I was finally getting my timing down and hitting the ball with some purpose toward the end of last session, not to mention finally getting off the ground more than an inch or two (let's face it... this white man really can't jump). Now I have to lay off a bit until my shoulder feels better. Maybe I should go see the doctor. Damn shoulder.

Kim got us Blue Man Group tickets for this Saturday. Actually, she got them for me as a Christmas present. I'm so excited! Kim's so awesome. I've been wanting to see this show forever. It's an early show in the city - 4:00pm - so we're going to hit the show then do dinner somewhere in the city. The show is just down the street from my favorite Mexican place, El Jardin, so we may go there. Hell, the show is just down the street from any number of great places.

I almost forgot... Tony and Heather bought a house! Heather currently lives outside of Boston and is moving here in, uhm, April I think. Yeah, I think they close in March and they're moving in April. Something like that.
Anyway, that's so cool! I'm a little bummed that they're moving all the way up to Lake Forest, but oh well. It's good for them, which is what's important I guess.

Shoot... looks like I need to archive the rambles from the second half of 2002 and start fresh with 2003. Yeah, I'll get right on that.

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